As persons age they may spend an increasing amount of time in promixity and emotional closeness to their homes. The nature of the attachment and factors relating to an increasing closeness to home are poorly documented and little understood. This proposed research will investigate this sense of attachment by examining the possible role of the home for the elderly in the maintenance and enhancement of the self and in mediating the relationship between self and society. Because of the wide range of possible meanings and function of home for the elderly, the proposed research will explore the subjective meaning of home for the elderly as well as processes by which home may acquire or change meaning. The primary methodology to be used in investigating the subjective meaning of home of the elderly will be that of anthropological field participant observation. This method, incorporating unstructured, directed, and structured techniques, will enable the collection of substantial subjective data on the home and home environment in the lives of a small sample of elderly. We will use data gathered from this participant observation phase to construct a general model of home relations and to test hypotheses associated with the model on a larger sample of subjects. The proposed research should not only provide a significant empirical base for the understanding of home and the home environment in the lives of the elderly but also should provide important data concerning such issues for the elderly as meaning systems, life and housing satisfaction, social integration, and ego development.